<?php
/**
 * <https://y.st./>
 * Copyright © 2017 Alex Yst <mailto:copyright@y.st>
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**/

$xhtml = array(
	'<{title}>' => 'I&apos;m barely keeping up.',
	'takedown' => '2017-11-01',
	'<{body}>' => <<<END
<img src="/img/CC_BY-SA_4.0/y.st./weblog/2017/02/15.jpg" alt="A bowl of salsa with nutritional yeast sprinkled on top" class="framed-centred-image" width="800" height="480"/>
<section id="general">
	<h2>General news</h2>
	<p>
		My battery seems to be doing a lot better, now that it&apos;s been taped together for about four of days.
		It seems to hold a charge well and everything.
		The issue with the album tracks ostensibly still persists, though I honestly didn&apos;t actually check on it today.
		There was no time.
	</p>
	<p>
		Tonight, I&apos;m headed home.
		I&apos;m bringing my laundry with me, along with my laundry hamper.
		I&apos;ve been very conservative with laundry this week due to having been in the process of moving it all home.
		I&apos;ve worn the same two outfits all week, not counting my work uniforms.
		There&apos;s a possibility that I won&apos;t need to do laundry yet once I get home, but I might end up having to.
		In any case, I need to drop off my dirty laundry and pick up clean laundry for at least the first half of the week if not the whole week.
		I&apos;ll see how much fits in my computer bag, which I&apos;m now using as an overnight bag.
		Work uniforms will of course take first priority, along with undergarmets.
		Hopefully if I don&apos;t have enough laundry to wash a load, I at least have enough clean work uniforms for the week at home.
		That&apos;s not at all likely though.
		Unfortunately, it&apos;s also raining.
		It&apos;s been raining all day.
		I was going to bring my computer monitor instead of my hamper, but I was afraid that even if I put a bag around it, I might get it wet.
		The laundry hamper is a safer option, being made of plastic.
		I was going to take the monitor anyway despite the risks, but I talked myself into taking the hamper instead.
		My original plan with the hamper was to fill it with something before taking it over.
		However, it&apos;s cracked.
		It&apos;s not going to take much weight to mess it up further.
		Additionally, it was designed to have quite a few large holes in it.
		Smaller objects could tumble out.
		I know that it&apos;s just rationalization, and that I should honestly take the monitor instead, but I feel better holding off on that.
		I&apos;ve also saved the relevant chapters of my textbook to my mobile in case I do end up doing laundry and have time to read before returning.
	</p>
	<p>
		My <a href="/a/canary.txt">canary</a> still sings the tune of freedom and transparency.
	</p>
</section>
<section id="university">
	<h2>University life</h2>
	<p>
		I finished up my essay on <a href="/en/coursework/PHIL1404/Cultural_relativism.xhtml">cultural relativism</a>, as well as completed my discussion assignment and took the ungraded and graded quizzes.
	</p>
	<blockquote>
		<p>
			I agree, this thought experiment is very much tied to egoism.
			It&apos;s a way to apply egoism more effectively, or rather, I think that it&apos;s meant to be.
		</p>
	</blockquote>
	<blockquote>
		<p>
			Everything that ever happens is a reaction to that which came before.
			Because of that, you&apos;re right, everything is predetermined.
			Not by some supernatural force as some might claim, but certainly by the state of the universe as it is.
			Because of this, it&apos;s pretty easy to poke holes in thought experiments such as the eternal return.
			While they&apos;re designed to help guide us in living our lives, they&apos;re not fleshed out enough to be as useful as intended.
			For example, you mention that all the variables would be the same, leading to the same result.
			One of the major variables is your own knowledge.
			In the first life, you have no memory of past times that you&apos;ve experienced the event, as you&apos;ve never experienced it before.
			However, in the next loop, you probably <strong>*still*</strong> think that this is the first time.
			If you live a bad life, it doesn&apos;t feel like an eternal torture because you don&apos;t remember it happening more than once!
			Likewise, a good life doesn&apos;t feel like eternal bliss!
			But what if we say that we keep our memories, allowing the eternal return to actually mean something.
			In that case, because we have to relive the same exact choices, we can&apos;t make new ones!
			Even most awesome lives will become torture!
			We&apos;d be bored out of our minds after enough iterations had passed.
			If you really think about it, the eternal return promotes a passive and contented lifestyle of small pleasures that will never get old, but no real excitement.
			I don&apos;t think that that was the intended purpose of the thought experiment though.
		</p>
		<p>
			I think that the eternal return could in theory be a useful thought experiment.
			However, it would need to be modified to include more details and provide certain parameters that change between iterations and others that carry over between iterations.
			For example, maybe your memories carry over between iterations and the results of risking any dangers are altered, as to preserve excitement.
		</p>
	</blockquote>
	<blockquote>
		<p>
			You&apos;re right.
			Different people have different situations, and because of that, they have different opportunities available to them.
			Even if everyone had the same moral framework and values, everyone would have a different &quot;correct&quot; choice based on their particular situations.
		</p>
		<p>
			Diverting from ethical norms could cost Tanksley their job, I agree.
			However, I think that that&apos;s beside the point.
			Tanksley <strong>*chose*</strong> this job and they enjoy it.
			If they had to start all again, they say that they&apos;d choose this job again.
			They have no regrets, which is more what the eternal return is (supposed to be) about.
		</p>
	</blockquote>
	<blockquote>
		<p>
			Having one of Souza does some damage, but like you said, if everyone acted like that, we wouldn&apos;t live long as a species.
		</p>
		<p>
			It must be nice knowing what you want to spend your life doing.
			Personally, I&apos;m still searching, but Tanksley&apos;s got it made.
		</p>
		<p>
			As you explained, it&apos;s not hard to choose Tanksley&apos;s life over Souza&apos;s.
			Some degree of self-interest is good, but Souza took it way too far when they put out hits on people.
			A life of happy service would be much better than a life of happy homicide.
		</p>
		<p>
			(Huh.
			I just realized that the root word of &quot;homicide&quot; is &quot;homo&quot;, as in the killing of homo sapiens.
			I hadn&apos;t noticed that before.)
		</p>
	</blockquote>
	<p>
		I&apos;m behind in my reading.
		I hope to have that completed before I head into work tomorrow.
	</p>
</section>
END
);
